I retired from teaching in 2008 after 31 year teaching wood shop and construction related classes. This blogs intent is to continue to share my love and knowledge of wood working with others. My online portfolio can be viewed at www.woodworksbyjohn.com. By posting comments, pictures, and also sharing the thought process I go through to complete my commissions I hope to continue to share my work with you.

About Me

I'm a woodworker that does commissions for one of a kind, custom work. I will share and answer questions regarding my posts or anything else pertaining to woodworking.
I also offer one on one instruction from my shop in Las Vegas that can be tailored around your schedule and what aspect of woodworking you'd like to learn more about. Contact me for details.

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Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Sin City Woodworkers

Before I get into the design process of the pistol case I need to give credit to Philip Popurka of Bison Studio here in Las Vegas. He makes quality tools for the people who work with ceramics and gave me all kinds of background information regarding pistol boxes. I was introduced to him by Jamie Yocono of Wood It Is which is her shop here in Las Vegas. Jamie is the driving force behind the Sin City Woodworkers and we meet once a month at her shop. It's a great way to get together with other woodworkers and "talk wood". You can find out more information about the group on Meet Up.
Anyway, back to Philip. He was good enough to let me come to his studio and showed me examples of the work he has done with the fitted gun case. When I explained to him what my ideas were for the one I'm designing he pointed out the authentic way it was done, which explains why these custom cases start at about $600.00 and go into the thousands on the web. I think we agreed that the design I suggested should be called a contemporary pistol case. He told me that other box makers have been known to try to fool the public by making an inferior box and then try to pass it off as authentic. The level of knowledge and information he has is impressive!
The pistol case I'm building will also be used for taking the pistol from the house to the shooting event. It will resemble a brief case and be lined with leather to stand up to the oil and gun powder residue. Traditional boxes were mitered but mine will use finger joints for strength and have floating panels for the top and bottom. Since there is the possibility of two more cases for identical pistols I've made a pattern to fit the pistol and the powder horn. That was quite a time consuming step for this projcet, I'll add a picture of it in my next post.